A blog on the current crises in the Middle East and news accounts unpublished by the US press. Daily timeline of events in Iraq as collected from stories and dispatches in the French and Italian media: Le Monde (Paris), Il Corriere della Sera (Milan), La Repubblica (Rome), L'Orient-Le Jour (Beirut) and occasionally from El Mundo (Madrid).

Saturday, October 15, 2005

Ibero-American Summit Leaders Demand End to US Embargo of Cuba

The city of Salamanca is hosting the XV Iberoamerican Summit and nearly every Latin leader from the Americas is there. This afternoon, the group issued its closing communiqué, condemning the United States for its "blockade" of Cuba and demanding an immediate end. The Summit deliberately chose the word "blockade" over "embargo" for the document. The US Embassy in Madrid delivered a note to the Spanish government conveying its concern at the "incoherence" of the statement.

The Summit also insisted on the extradition to Venezuela from the United States of anti-Castro terrorist Luis Posada Carriles

Mexico's President, Vincete Fox, won't get another invitation to Crawford from Dubya after this: At the end of the day, blockade and embargo mean the same thing. I'm not worried [about Washington's ire]...I never worry when I defend the principles and values which Mexico stands behind internationally. One of those principles is to reject intervention, blockades and embargoes--they are not the way to go.